Building date: 1840s
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Map views courtesy Google Maps. Structure not visible from street level view. Address is Google Earth confirmed; 42°56'02.74"N 77°30'31.01"W. Current owner of record, Lansing as of the 2019 Tax Roll.
Town of West Bloomfield and Ontario County Maps
This house at 8574 County Route 14, near Ionia Corners, appears to have been built in the 1840s by the original owners, Isaac and Lucinda A. Ball. In 1846 they sold it to Selas and Almira Miller. It was subsequently sold numerous times. During the early 1930s it was operated as a tea room by Helen Nugent Druschel and her sister, Katherine Nugent Reill. They served buffet meals on Sunday evenings. It was was very popular spot and was widely advertised. During the week private dinner parties were held, the specialty being porterhouse steak and all the trimmings, including homemade ice cream - all for one dollar.
The walls of the house were built of fieldstone of different sizes, shapes and colors, laid in four and five courses to the quoin height. Split gray imedstone blocks were used as quoins.
The wide pine board floors were covered with homemade rag carpets. In 1956 it was purchased by Reta and Gerret Lansing. At one time it was used the cellar to store potatoes. After they died, their son, Chris Lansing, abandoned the house and made over the adjacent barn as his home, preferring it to the house which had become badly deteriorated. He was still living there in 2018. Richard Palmer blog.
"The Cobblestone Houses of Upstate New York", compiled by Dorothy Wells Pease. Research done in collaboration with Hazed B. Jeffery, supplemented with material furnished by Carl F. Schmidt, 1941. Reference the tenth paragraph on page 17.
![]() 8574 Route 14, Ionia, Ontario County.jpg ¹ | ![]() 8574 County Route 14.jpg ¹ | ![]() Wbl_5_1.jpg | ![]() Wbl-5 8574 Rt 14 1 ² |
![]() Wbl-5 8574 Rt 14 2.jpg ² | ![]() 8574 County Route 14, West Bloomfield (2).jpg ³ | ![]() 8574 County Route 14, West Bloomfield (3).jpg ³ Facing east | ![]() 8574 County Route 14, West Bloomfield (1).jpg ³ Facing south |
![]() 8574 County Route 14, West Bloomfield (4).jpg ³ Facing west (north side inaccessible) |
¹ Image courtesy Richard Palmer Blog. Attribution not provided.
² Photography courtesy Martin and Sheila Wolfish.
³ Photography courtesy Richard Palmer.